Episode 103 • Breaking Things
Shatter
Snap
Crack
Scratch
Tear up
Story
[Knocking]
Daughter: Daddy, can I come play in your office for a while? I’m bored.
Dad: Fine, Zoe. But don’t touch anything, you know there are a lot of expensive things in here and the last time you hung out in my office, you hit that beautiful lamp your grandma had given us and it shattered. Remember? So what do we not do in Daddy’s office?
Daughter: We don’t play ball?
Dad: Correct.
Daughter: Okay, daddy. Daddy, can I draw something?
Dad: Uh, sure. Grab some paper from that tray.
Daughter: Do you have a pencil?
Dad: Here. Careful, it’s a gift from a client.
[Drawing sounds]
Daughter: Mmh, no, I don’t like this [tearing sounds]. Oopsie, I don’t know where your pencil went, Daddy. I’ll see if I can find it….
Dad: No, Zoe, stay there, I will— [Snapping sound].
Daughter: Oh oh… Dad, something just snapped under my foot. It’s your pencil, Daddy. We can still use this part though, I think.
Dad: Zoe… listen just— just sit here, okay. Here, take my iPad and— Zoe? Zoe, what happened to my iPad?!
Daughter: I just used it to draw, I mean, I don’t have a desk here, so I put the paper on top of it and then—
Dad: The screen is cracked.
Daughter: What? No! Let me see. It’s just scratched, Dad, I think. Look, if I—
Dad: Zoe, it’s cracked, look…I can barely see what it says here.
Daughter: Sorry, Dad. I think I may have pressed too hard with the pencil…
[Phone ringing]
Dad: Hey, Roger. Yes, yes. Of course I have the document, it’s right— Honey, did you take that very important-looking piece of paper that was on Daddy’s desk?
Daughter: What? This one?
Dad: You tore tore it up?!
Daughter: Yeah, look! That butterfly I drew was no good, Daddy, was it?
Questions
Shatter
'...you hit that beautiful lamp your grandma had given us and it shattered.'
• If something shatters, is it only partially damaged or is it completely destroyed?
If you shatter something, or if something shatters, it means that it breaks completely. It's going to be completely destroyed.
• If something shatters, does it break slowly or suddenly?
If something shatters, it breaks suddenly. It falls and then immediately [shattering sound] it just shatters, it's completely destroyed.
• What objects can easily shatter?
Anything that's made out of glass or china can easily shatter, anything that is rigid and fragile. If, for example, a teacup falls, or a glass, or even a window, they could shatter. When you drop a glass and it breaks into a million teeny tiny pieces, that is what shattering is.
• Have you ever shattered something?
Not on purpose. I have broken a few glasses just because I'm very clumsy, so, if I'm cleaning or if I'm doing the dishes, I don't pay a lot of attention, so, a lot of times I will drop a glass or two, or a plate, or something. I have broken a few glasses, especially, but nothing ever shattered in like a million pieces, it was just one or two parts. When I do throw out all of the glass stuff that we have accumulated, all of the jars-- If you recycle, you're supposed to throw them into a specific container where all the glass is collected. When you throw them inside this container, then they do shatter. You can hear like [attempted shattering sound] Okay, that's not the sound that they make, I can't make it. I'll see if I can insert a sound of glass shattering here. [glass shattering]
Snap
'Dad, something just snapped under my foot.'
• When something snaps, what sound will it make?
If something snaps, it's going to make this sound, [snapping sound].
• What can snap? Something hard or something soft?
It's definitely something hard. If it snaps and it makes this cracking sound like [snapping sound], I feel like all of my sounds sound the same. If it makes this snapping sound, this cracking sound, it's usually something hard and, I want to say, something even long like a pencil or a twig, like a little stick. When you break those things into two parts, you're going to hear that sound.
Crack
'The screen is cracked.'
• If a surface is cracked, is it only partially damaged or is it completely destroyed?
If a surface is cracked, it's only partially damaged. That means that a little bit of the surface is broken, so to say, it's cracked.
• If something is cracked, what will you usually see when looking at it? Lines or holes?
If something is cracked, you are going to see a line, maybe two lines, maybe some lines that intersect but yes, you're going to see what we call a crack because it's cracked. You're going to see a bunch of lines that run through the surface.
• What can crack?
Walls can crack. For example, in the living room, in the place where I'm staying at, there is a little crack in one of the walls. Then, screens. Unfortunately, screens can crack very easily. If you drop your phone or your tablet, the screen might crack.
• Are any of your devices cracked?
The screen of my old phone is cracked. It was pretty new when that happened. I bought it three, four months before that and then one morning, it just fell. Okay, it didn't fall, I dropped it. [chuckles] I'm going to take responsibility for this. I picked it up with that fear that you always get when you drop your phone and I thought, "Oh, my gosh, let's hope that nothing has happened to my screen." Sure thing, I saw this huge crack right in the middle of it. Luckily, I could still use my phone fine. In fact, I kept it for two whole years, but, yes, for two whole years, my phone screen was cracked.
Scratch
'Let me see. It’s just scratched, Dad, I think.'
• If a surface is scratched, is it only partially damaged or is it completely destroyed?
If a surface is scratched, it's only partially damaged.
• If something is scratched, what will you usually see when looking at it? Lines or holes?
Once again, you are going to see lines. It can be one line, it can be multiple lines, and it's usually separate lines.
• Which is deeper, a crack or a scratch?
This is the big difference, I think, because a scratch is not as deep as a crack. A crack, you know that -- the glass or the surface, whatever, the material, has been damaged pretty deeply, so the line is pretty deep. With a scratch, it's more superficial. It's only a problem that has to do with the very surface. In fact, if something is scratched, again, it can be a screen, like your phone screen, even your car, it can get scratched accidentally. It doesn't mean that there's a problem with what's beneath it, it's more of an aesthetic problem, it's just not as nice to look at. If your phone screen is scratched, maybe it's not as easy to watch a movie, for example, but your phone is still going to work fine.
• What can you do to prevent your phone screen from getting scratched?
I guess that if you are a responsible adult, you can buy one of those protective glasses type of thing that you can just stick on top of your screen so that it protects the actual screen. If you drop your phone or something happens to your phone, then it might get scratched but it's not the actual screen that gets scratched, it's this glass. Since for some reason I never wanted to spend the money on that thing, I just try to be extra careful whenever I put my phone away, for example, in my bag. I try to put it in a place where I do not keep my keys, because I feel like that is one of the easiest ways to get your phone scratched. If you are keeping your keys together with your phone, then that's it. Sooner or later you're going to get a scratch on it, no matter what you do. I try to be good about it but if you look at my phone, there are quite a few scratches on it, so apparently, I'm not doing that great of a job.
Tear up
'You tore it up?!'
• If you tear something up, what sound will you hear?
If you tear something up, you're going to hear this sound, [tearing sound].
• What can you usually tear up? Something very thin or something very thick?
If you want to be able to tear something up, it needs to be something that's very, very thin. We're talking about a piece of paper, cardboard, even fabric, but it needs to be thin.
• If you tear up a piece of paper, can you put it back together?
Not really. You can, for example, use some tape and try and put it back together but once you've done the damage, once you've torn something up, there's not much that you can do. You can either sew it back up or you can tape it back up but it's not easy. You will still see that it had been torn at some point.
• Do you usually tear up boxes and other cardboard containers before throwing them out?
I used to do it because the garbage can that I had was very small. I had no choice but to tear up the boxes that I had to throw away. Otherwise, after I put one box in, I wouldn't be able to put anything else in, because it would take up so much space. Now that I have a larger garbage can, it's not even a garbage can, it's just a big bag where we keep all the paper and cardboard, I've gotten a little lazy so no, most of the times I don't tear them up. Then, if I run out of space, then I will usually get a box or two out, I will tear them up and put them back in so I gain a little bit of extra space.
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4 thoughts on “Episode 103 • Breaking Things”
Ottimo lavoro Lara.. mi piaciono tutti audio ch fai per noi.. grazie mille verament !! Ho Saputo che sei italiana quando hai parlato qualcosa in italiano durante uno dei tuoi episodi.. io sono di India.
Hi Tej! Thank you so much. 🥰 Sì, sono italiana! Ma parli italiano anche tu quindi? 🤩 Dove l’hai imparato?
You are creative!
Love it
Thank you so much, Yvette! 😍🥰